the REFUGE

In the story of the judgement of the sheep and the goats in the Gospel of Matthew we are taken a further step in our meditations. Both groups are told that their response to the suffering of the hungry, the homeless, the imprisoned and others among the forgotten and the injured is their response to Christ. When,in the Acts of the Apostles, Paul is knocked off his high horse by the Light that shines more brightly than the Noonday Sun, he is told by the one that he rightly addresses as ‘Lord” that he is persecuting Christ in persecuting the church.

Christ has taken upon himself all of human suffering. Whenever you see human suffering you see Christ’s continuing suffering. Pascal said “Christ is on the cross until the end of the world.” What we do to the insulted and the injured of the world we do to Christ.In the end we are either on the cross with Christ or we are among his crucifiers.This is why, in Dostoyevsky’s “The Brothers Karamazov”, when the holy staretz, Father Zosima, enters the room and perceives the great sufferings ahead for Dimitri Karamazov, he falls on the ground and reveres those sufferings. He reveres them because they are the wounds of Christ.

James rebukes the Christians of his day for prefering the rich to the poor. Unfortunately this distortion of Christian praxis has not disappeared. The mainstream churches of the modern West are generally churches of the professional middle class.The poor and other sufferers are not treated as icons of Christ but as defective people who need to be straightened out by professionals or as objects of cheap and uninvolved ‘charitable’ acts that are nothing more than contemporary analogues of Lady Bountiful wrapping Christmas packages for the faithful poor. There’s no extension of friendship and solidarity.And what we do to such is what we do to Christ.

May God bring us all to see that our only hope of salvation lies in our recognition that we too are the poor and the needy. That we must deliberately enter into solidarity with them because we in fact are one with them. And since all suffering is the suffering of Christ it is there where we can find our Lord and worship him.

-Frank Valdez

To Everyone who supports, or is concerned about Poverty and Poor People’s Rights,

Please consider helping Refuge Ministries and the local Poor People’s Economic Human Rights Campaign Chapter. We are currently in dire need of financial help. Currently, the Refuge and the local chapter of PPEHRC are housing 3 families, a total of 12 people, including 6 children, in a local church, at the graciousness of that church. It is one of the churches where the Refuge uses office space. We are in dire need of financial help to keep the ministry going and assist these and other families and individuals. One of the families, which is 6 people, is staying at the Church due to their power being shut of at their house. They are on assistance and do not have enough to pay bill. The other families are homeless. This family is in danger of being homeless. They are a few of the many families we are dealing with in this situation. We are trying to raise $2400 to help these families. Additionally, the Refuge is having a shortfall of $1675 this month due to all these needs. I am currently driving a vehicle without air that has mechanical problems to transport people around and we desperately need another vehicle with air that runs good.

In addition to this, we are trying to bring poor people, formerly and currently homeless, as well as the unemployed to an event in Pittsburgh in a week and a half. We need to raise $2450 for this. We are bringing 10 people to this event. We need to rent a van and pay for gas. It is going to be a tent city with poor and homeless people, on Church grounds, during the G20 Summit. It is sponsored by the Bail out the People, The Refuge, and the Poor Peoples Economic Human Rights Campaign. We need support for this. Your help is urgently needed for both this event and the Refuge. We also want to bring up tents, blankets, sleeping bags, and canned goods. Please, Please help us with this event and the families we are trying to help.

If you wish to help, you can give via pay pal (on the right of your screen). Or, you can email me at bgcwright@aol.com or call me at 727 278 1547. You can mail gifts to the Refuge 1818 29th Ave. North, St. Petersburg, Florida 33713. We can also tell you how to direct deposit funds into account. PLEASE HELP US, THIS IS URGENT. For more info on G20 Summit tent city go to www.bailoutpeople.org or www.economichumanrights.org.

Thanks, Bruce